Page 24 - Windows 10 May 2019 Update The Missing Manual: The Book That Should Have Been in the Box

Note

Most people get Windows 10 preinstalled on the computers they buy. The only reason you’d ever
have to buy Windows 10 is (a) if you have an ancient Windows 7 or 8 PC you want to update (and
you missed the year when Microsoft offered a free update to Windows 10), or (b) if you’ve built a
PC from scratch.
In either of those cases, you get Windows 10 by going to microsoft.com/en-us/windows/get-
windows-10 and paying $120 for Windows 10 Home or $200 for Windows 10 Pro. You’ll get a
confirmation email containing your “product key” (a unique serial number, to prove you’re not a
software pirate).

There are, meanwhile, three versions of Windows 10 that you can’t buy on
the website:

Windows 10 Enterprise, which is available exclusively to
corporate system administrators. It includes advanced tools for

security and management.

Windows 10 Education. Mostly the same software as Enterprise,

but sold exclusively to schools and school systems.

S mode. Here and there, you may run across references to S mode.

Microsoft says the S stands for Security, Simplicity, and Superior
performance, although it could also stand for Students and
Savings; it’s designed for schools or other institutions that want

cheap computers. Behind the scenes, S mode is Microsoft’s attempt
to duplicate the success of Google’s simple, inexpensive
Chromebook laptops.

S mode is a version of Windows 10 that limits you to apps you get
from the Microsoft Store. Which means you can’t run programs
like Photoshop, Quicken, Chrome, and Firefox.

S mode also forces you to use Edge as your default web browser
and Bing as your default search engine (you can still manually call
up Google). You can’t use any technical tools like PowerShell, the

Command Prompt, or the Registry Editor, either.